Julie is sharing how to make a gorgeous, multi-colored background with one of her favorite tools: The rubber brayer!
Hey, hello, hi! It’s Julie on the blog today! The rubber brayer is probably one of the most underrated tools in a stamper’s tool box. I’ve loved and used mine for decades and even own them in two sizes—they’re among the best investments I’ve made for crafting! While I’m working with the Speedball brand, which I’ve owned for many years, Ranger recently released two sizes of brayers that feature black rubber and are receiving rave reviews from paper crafters! Be sure to check them out if you think think this easy and quick technique is one you’d enjoy!
TIPS:
- Keep a jar or tub of water and a lint-free cloth to rinse and dry your brayer between colors; this avoids ink pad cross contamination and keeps colors on your project from muddying!
- Always roll and lift your brayer to load ink; the brayer needs to spin in complete rotations to receive ink all the way around.
- Roll and lift to transfer ink to porous paper surfaces.
- Porous papers, i.e. Neenah Solar White can yield a more “distressed” effect whereas coated, glossy or vellum papers can yield a smoother/more seamless blend; experiment to find the end result you desire for your project.
- If your brayer is too wide, try inking only a portion of it along the end of the ink pad.
- Rotate project and brayer in various directions for more textured looks/effects.
- Test how the colors of ink appear on scrap paper when layered over each other before using them on your project; you may like some and dislike others. This is especially true of dye inks because of their transparency; opaque inks such as Distress Oxide or pigment inks will yield different results when layered.
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